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Nintendo GameCube
Nintendo Gamecube is Nintendo's fourth home game console system, succeding the Nintendo 64. The Gamecube was released about the same time as Microsoft's Xbox, which outsold the Gamecube. The Gamecube was designed to be geared towards children, but there were many mature-rated games such as Resident Evil 4. Release The Gamecube was released in November, 2001 with many new games, such as Pikmin and Luigi's Mansion. These games did sell well, but the most popular game on the Gamecube was Super Smash Bros. Melee, which was the sequal to the very popular Super Smash Bros. on the Nintendo 64. Game Selection Like mentioned earlier, the Gamecube was geared towards children, with most games being rated E for everyone. A launch title with the teen rating was LucasArts' Star Wars Rogue Squadron: Rogue Leader. Resident Evil 4 was an exclusive game on the Gamecube, but has now been also released for Sony's PS2. Hardware Console The console contained four controller ports, two memory card slots, and a disk drive. The disk drive opened from the top and accepted 1.5GB DVDs. These mini-dvds were much smaller than the regular sized DVDs that Microsoft and Sony used in their consoles. On top of the console was a power button, a reset button and a open disk button. On the back were plugins for video out, component video out, and power. There were also three expansion sockets on the bottom for broadband and dial-up access to online games. Very few games took advantage of this add-on as it required a purchase to buy the additional hardware for the online function to work. Controller The controller (seen above) has six buttons, two triggers, and two analog sticks. The buttons were A, B, X, Y, Z, and Start/Pause. The triggers were on the shoulders of the controller and were named L(eft) and R(ight). The grey analog stick was used for controlling and moving your character, while the yellow C-Stick was used mostly for changing views. The controller fit well in most people's hands and was well liked in the gaming industry. Specs The Gamecube featured a custom IBM PowerPC "Gekko" processor that ran at 485MHz. The graphics card was also custom made by ATI and was codenamed "Flipper." Accessories Memory Cards Memory Cards for the Gamecube were made by Nintendo and third party companies. They started out small, first only offering a 59 block memory card. After a while, they released a black memory card that held almost four times the memory at 251 blocks. The final Nintendo memory card for the Gamecube was white, and held over 1,000 blocks. Broadband/Dial-up Adapters Released after the original release of the Gamecube, the internet adapters were rarely taken advantage of while on the Gamecube. Very few games actually used the adapters in their games. Game Boy Player The Game Boy Player allowed Game Boy and Game Boy Advance games to be played on the Gamecube. The player came with a disk that was inserted into the Gamecube's disk drive. Then the player was attached to the bottom using one of the expansion ports on the bottom. The gamer then used the Gamecube controller to control their player in the Game Boy games, except now on the larger TV screen.